No Defense

by Rangeley Wallace

  The smell of the butter, eggs, and toast in the air reminded me of even earlier times. “I feel like a little kid who’s home from school, being taken care of by her mother,” I said. “But-” I stopped abruptly.

  “What?” Mother asked. Her back was to me as she cooked over the stove.

  “But it seems like lifetimes ago. I just don’t remember you and me like this-relaxing together, you know, hanging out. Not after I was bigger, anyway.”

  Mother turned around, holding the cast-iron frying pan full of eggs in her left hand, the spatula in her right, and frowned slightly as she scraped the eggs out onto a plate. She served me, then pulled out a chair and sat down across from me. She looked at me expectantly.

  I thought back over my high-school and junior-high years. “You and I never avoided each other, I don’t think,” I said. “We just spent less and less time together over the years. It was always Daddy and me, and Jane and you. Why do you suppose that was?”

  “I don’t really know,” she said. “Over the weekend, waiting next to Jane’s hospital bed and struggling with the biggest decision I’ve ever had to make, I thought about you and your sister, how you gravitated toward Newell, and Jane toward me. I can’t pinpoint any particular event. All I know for sure is that by the time you were twelve or thirteen that’s how our family was divided. Eat something, please.” She pursed her lips and watched me, waiting for me to eat.

  I picked up the fork and pushed my eggs around. “I feel responsible,” I said. I took a bite of toast.

  “For what?”

  “Everything, including our relationship back then.”

  “Oh, LuAnn. You were only a child. I didn’t even realize the family had split along those lines-you and Newell, and Jane and me-until it was too late. Relationships change gradually. Nothing seems to change day to day, then suddenly everything is different and you can’t put your finger on what happened. Just like I didn’t realize Newell was in love with someone else until the affair ended.”

  I dropped my fork. “You knew about Liz Reese?” I asked.

  “I wasn’t sure who she was until the trial, but I knew he had been in love with someone besides me. I finally figured out last week who it had to be, and then I called Junior and told him what I believed had really happened. Then Junior called her and she testified.” Mother took hold of the cross she wore on a slim gold chain around her neck and pulled it back and forth against the chain. She appeared lost in thought.

  “You!” Choking on the bite of eggs I’d just eaten, I patted my chest, swallowed, and took a breath. “I can’t believe it! Does Daddy know it was you who brought Liz Reese back?”

  “I told him Monday afternoon, after the trial ended. And I told him I’d gladly do it again and that if he ever hurt one of my children again I’d leave him for good.” Her normally complacent tone was replaced by a defiant one.

  “How did you know for sure what had happened?” I asked. “How’d you figure it out?”

  “It was the only explanation. In the first place, I never believed your father’s line that he was behaving like a fool to uphold some great principle-to make the government meet its burden of proof. I know him too well. He would have been the first to say, Hey, I was at work or whatever. It had to be that he didn’t want to reveal where he was that night. All I knew for sure was that he wasn’t with me or at home. But I also knew he didn’t kill anyone. And I knew he was in love with someone else around that time. It was then just a matter of listening to the testimony.”

  “Did you tell Daddy what you were going to do before you talked to Junior?”

  “Are you kidding? I didn’t want to give him a chance to talk me out of it. He’s a very persuasive man. I don’t think he would ever have told the truth if I hadn’t intervened.”

  “What if he were convicted? Surely he would have said something then?”

  “He was so sure he wouldn’t be, and he was probably right. He was furious when I told him I had convinced Junior to call Liz Reese. He thought I went to Junior to save him. But I told him that saving him had nothing to do with my actions, that I went to Junior because his version of the truth was not acceptable. I wanted everyone else to see what really happened fifteen years ago, especially Jane and you. Newell and I had a fight about it Monday night. He was sitting where you’re sitting now, yelling at me.”

  “What did he say? Why did he put us through it?”

  “He thought his election chances were better if the State failed to prove its case than if he told the whole story right up front, and he wanted to protect Liz Reese and her daughter from the past.”

  “What about us?” I asked. Again I felt about as significant to my father as one of his fishing worms.

  “He thought we could take it, he said, especially you. He thinks you’re tough. We knew he was innocent, he said, so he didn’t think we had anything to lose. He couldn’t understand why that wasn’t enough.”

  “I was a wreck, and he knew it! I couldn’t take it. He could even have told us the truth and then gone ahead with his crazy trial strategy. Even that wouldn’t have been as horrid as the last months have been. He could have told Ben in the beginning and stopped the whole investigation. There are so many ways Daddy could have avoided all of the terrible things we all went through. How could he allow Chip to put Jane through that cross-examination?”

  “He assumed she’d never testify, he said.”

  “But when she did, at that point he should have stood up and explained how the murders really happened. Why did he want so badly to protect Liz Reese?”

  “Well, I think he still loves her in a way. At least he feels something intense for her. She was very young during their affair. He says he owed it to her after all she’d been through. And her daughter, Camille, never knew her father. Newell figured she’d be crushed if she knew the truth about Dean Reese.”

  “So he let me and Jane be crushed instead. We’re only his daughters.” I shook my head.

  “She reminds me of you,” Mother said.

  “Who?”

  “Liz Reese. Both of you are beautiful, smart, assertive young women. Your father’s type. I never was.”

  “So why aren’t you leaving him? He deserves it.”

  “We’ll see how your father and I adjust to one another now. It won’t be easy, but I’m hopeful.”

  “Why? He’s mean and selfish! I’d leave him if I were you.”

  “I’m not that surprised, you see, that he did what he did.”

  “You’ve always known he was such a monster?” I asked sarcastically. “That’s great.”

  “That’s just it. He’s not, LuAnn. You idolize him. I know him. You’ve always worshiped him. I haven’t. I’m not saying what he did wasn’t thoughtless, even cruel. But my expectations have never been as high as yours, and I can’t let my marriage go as easily as some.” She looked at me knowingly.

  “I haven’t let mine go,” I said defensively.

  “Sure seems like it,” she said. “What are you going to do about your marriage?”

  I sighed. “This morning I decided to move as soon as possible.”

  “Move where?” she asked, startled. “And do what?”

  “I don’t know. Away, that’s all. I don’t see how I can live here after the trial, and I don’t want to ever see Daddy again. It would be easier to leave.”

  “You are such a person of extremes, LuAnn. You go from one extreme--adoring him-to the other-wanting never to see him again. When you were little you always threatened to run away when life didn’t suit you.”

  “I don’t remember that.”

  “It’s true. Whenever you got mad, you’d tell us we would never see you again, pack your Mickey Mouse bag, and walk down the block. This decision is no different, except that it was easier for you to turn around and come home then. If you run away now, will you ever come back, even to visit?”

  “I haven’t thought that far ahead. I just want to go. That’s all I can deal with.”

/>   “Maybe it’s time you learned to temper your feelings, to see the shades of gray between the black and white. I hoped after this experience you’d be able to see your father for what he was and is: a human being, LuAnn, just like the rest of us. I’m not justifying or defending anything he did. It was wrong. He and I may not make it through all this, but he’s your father, he’ll always be your father, and you need to work out a relationship that isn’t based on fantasy. This is your chance to do that.” The more she talked, the weaker her gravelly voice became.

  “Leaving is a more attractive alternative right now.”

  “And what about Eddie? You can’t run off and leave Eddie,” she said.

  “Maybe he’d come too. Who knows?”

  “I don’t think he wants to leave Tallagumsa. He’s happy at the college, and the cartoons he’s done here are wonderful. Your children are content. You have the Steak House. Last time we spoke about the restaurant you called it the perfect job. If you throw all that away, don’t you think you’d be sorry? Stay and work this through. Come to church with me. That would help you, I know.”

  “I knew you couldn’t go through an entire conversation without mentioning church,” I said, smiling.

  “But I’ve been pretty good about it this afternoon,” she said, smiling back at me. “Only once in over an hour.”

  “I know that was hard for you.” I laughed. “Maybe you’re right. I shouldn’t make any rash decisions. But you didn’t want me to live here in the first place, remember? Turns out you were absolutely right.”

  “I didn’t want you to live here because I thought you were coming for all the wrong reasons, but now you’re here, and I don’t want you leaving for all the wrong reasons. You’ll have nothing to build a life on, leaving like that. Call Eddie today, why don’t you? Call him now.”

  “Maybe later. What about Barbara Cox? Are they ... Is he living with her?”

  “I have no idea. You’re his wife, though, the mother of his children. You go get him.”

  “Mother, you are too much today. I’m so proud of you.” I stood up and walked around the table and hugged her. “Go get him! Really.”

  I put my dish and cup in the sink. “You want some help with those clothes?” I asked.

  “That would be lovely,” she said.

  “Why don’t I fix us both some tea first,” I said. “Your throat could use it.”

  Tea in hand, we walked into the living room. She pointed to each pile. “That pile is for the wash, that one to be folded, and that one needs repair. I’ll be right back,” she said.

  She returned in a few minutes and handed me an envelope. I opened it and saw Ben’s all-too-familiar handwriting. It was dated two days earlier. Mother sat down on the rug across from me, sipping her tea and sorting. I read the letter.

  Dear LuAnn,

  How I wish we could have seen each other before I had to leave for D.C., but Jolene intercepted my calls and turned me away at your door. I wanted to wait you out, but the paper demanded my return for the time being. If I had seen you, I would have said good-bye, kissed you, and asked-where do we stand? I am here for you, or there; you tell me where and when and it’s done. I suspect you have a fair amount of figuring things out to do now after the trial. What do you want? When you know, call or come. Whatever happens, whatever you decide, I miss you and love you.

  Ben

  I folded the letter and put it back in the envelope.

  Mother looked at me, hoping I’d share the contents of Ben’s note with her.

  “He just wanted to say good-bye,” I said.

  “That’s all?”

  “Not exactly.”

  “Now I get it.” Her face fell. “You’re thinking of moving to Washington, aren’t you?” she asked sadly.

  “No! He doesn’t have anything to do with my wanting to leave.”

  Mother looked skeptical.

  “Really, he doesn’t. That’s one thing I’m sure of He’s a wonderful person, but he and I-that was all just another gigantic mistake. When I make mistakes, I make really big ones.”

  “I agree,” she said, smiling.

  I put the envelope down and picked up a familiar looking yellow and white plaid skirt. Could it be the one I’d worn in high school? Half the hem was ripped out. I searched through the sewing box and found white thread, a needle, and a thimble. I threaded the needle and began to sew.

  Mother stitched up the lining of an olive-green gabardine suit jacket.

  We worked together in friendly silence as the October sun began to drop toward the lake. The pile of clothes that needed repair was slowly shrinking.

  Soon a car came down the gravel road to the house, and Mother and I looked up expectantly from our sewing. I steeled myself for my father’s entrance. The last time I’d seen him we were in court and I slapped him. What would I do now? What would I say? I wasn’t ready for this.

  Perhaps I would never be ready, but I knew Mother was right. I had to face him and begin to build our relationship on an entirely different basis: one in which I was his equal, not his devotee; one in which I judged him by the same standards I judged others. I understood for the first time that I had to separate my well-being, success, and happiness from my father’s not by running away but by meeting him head-on.

  A car door slammed, and someone walked around the deck At first, with the glare of the sun behind the person, I had difficulty making out who was at the door. All I could see were cowboy boots and washed-out jeans.

  The door opened. It was Eddie. The answer to Ben’s question.

  I looked at Mother suspiciously. She smiled and stood up.

  “Did you call him?” I hissed.

  “Maybe,” she said. She walked out of the living room, down the hall toward her bedroom.

  Eddie walked in and I burst into tears.

  “You aren’t going to run out of the room, are you?” he asked.

  I shook my head.

  He sat down on the floor next to me. We both stared straight ahead, out toward the lake.

  “Sewing?” he asked. “Did you give up restaurant life for a career in fabrics?” he joked.

  I was too upset to say anything. Tears streamed down my face.

  “She told me you were calm-resigned but calm, was what she said. I guess she got it wrong.” He rested his right hand over my left and removed the silver thimble from my finger, then he tossed the thimble up in the air and caught it several times.

  “Who said that?” I asked, biting my lip and trying to slow the onslaught of tears.

  “Your mother.”

  “What else did she say?”

  “That you were thinking about leaving Tallagumsa.”

  “Don’t you think I should? I’ve made a mess of everything since I got here. Everything. It’s better sometimes to start over-a clean slate and all that.” I sniffed and blotted the tears on my face with the back of my hand.

  “What about me?” he asked.

  “What about you?”

  “I’m serious, LuAnn. Would you leave here without me? Are you so crazy now that you would even consider that?”

  “Well, what would you care? You and Barbara are pretty cozy, living and working together.”

  “You have no idea where I’ve been or with whom. You’ve refused to talk to me, remember?”

  “You could have talked to me if you really wanted to.”

  “You are such an idiot sometimes. I wasn’t about to throw myself down on the ground and kiss your feet, but I did try time and again to call you and see you, and you refused.”

  “Were you living with her or not?”

  “You don’t have much right to complain if I was, LuAnn, but in fact, I wasn’t. I stayed in Barbara’s living room a few nights until she left on some school trip. I baby-sat her dog until Labor Day, when she got back to town. Since then I’ve been at different teachers’ houses. Whoever would have me.”

  I picked up the pair of pants from my lap, scooped the thimble up off the floo
r where Eddie had put it, and continued sewing a gray patch over the worn-out knee. “I’m sorry,” I said, staring at the patch.

  Eddie didn’t say anything.

  I put the sewing materials on the floor and looked over at him. “I said I’m sorry,” I said louder.

  He turned toward me. “I forgive you,” he said, his searching gray eyes reading my feelings. “I know we can make it work out if we both try, LuAnn. What do you say? Are you ready.”

  “More ready than I’ve ever been. I love you, Eddie Garrett,” I said.

  Then he smiled that smile, wrapped his arms around me, and kissed me.

  “Let’s go home,” he said.

  “Why don’t you go ahead and talk to the kids? I’ll finish these clothes with Mother.” I kissed him. We lingered in each other’s arms for a few minutes, then he left.

  I walked down the hallway in search of my mother. Along the walls she’d hung a gallery of family portraits and snapshots. I stopped in front of the one of Jane and me at the beach after one of our sand castles was destroyed by high tide. In the photograph I am seven, Jane is thirteen. I am sobbing, with my head on Jane’s shoulder. Her arms are wrapped around me, consoling a sister who stubbornly refuses to accept the inevitable, a sister who insists on seeing life as she wants it to be, not as it is.

  I took a few steps, then paused in front of a snapshot taken at my high-school graduation. In the picture I am striding across the Tallagumsa High School stage wearing my cap and gown. I recalled believing that I had reached the absolute height of maturity at the moment nine years earlier when the principal handed me my diploma. Several feet away one of my favorite wedding day photographs shows me turning away from Daddy and towards Eddie, my hand reaching for my future husband’s as the preacher looks on. I remembered clearly just how grown up I thought I was when my father walked me down the church aisle and “gave me away.” Finally, near the end of the hallway, there was a photo of me relaxing in one of the tattered armchairs at the apartment in Atlanta. My bare feet are resting on a footstool, and newborn Jessie is in my lap. The corners of my mouth are lifted in a somewhat self-satisfied smile. When Eddie took that picture, I was congratulating myself on the ease with which I’d made the transition from childhood to womanhood.